


The Best Form of Flattery

by RyuRedwings



Series: Fox Fire [2]
Category: Teen Titans (Animated Series)
Genre: Fan Characters, Original Character(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-29
Updated: 2017-01-29
Packaged: 2018-09-20 14:10:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,119
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9494948
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RyuRedwings/pseuds/RyuRedwings
Summary: A new gang is running around dressed up as popular Teen Titans and committing crimes. It’s just seen as another crime spree until a Coyote look-alike destroys the police headquarters downtown… Using the exact same powers as the notable hero. Unable to wear the moniker until the imposter is caught, Cyrus tries to track down this new villain that can mimic his powers as quickly as he can, only to find out the villain may know more then just about his abilities.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This short story was inspired by SoulSerenade's wonderful characters, and my own, that were created for a fun Teen Titans roleplay group. These are our own original characters that were put into the DC universe.
> 
> You can find out more about SoulSerenade's characters here: https://paintberri.com/artist/SoulSerenade  
> You can find out more about Risu here: http://ryuredwingsreturn.tumblr.com/tagged/risu
> 
> Happy reading!

_ One, two, three… _

Risu counted in her head while she whisked the matcha in front of her, counting the seconds to make sure she didn’t overmix the tea. It was a matter of time and watching for the right amount of froth when it came to making it the way most customers liked it, and Mr. Fuji liked it extra frothy. She stopped when the bowl seemed overflowing with bubbles but not overmixed, and quickly poured it into the cup. She quickly arranged the rest of the order on the tray, picking up the sashimi plate and the edamame beans, and then stepped out from behind the sushi bar, tray in hand. Yama was working behind the bar as well, dutifully cleaning his work area, and checking over the fresh supplies of fish and octopus that were displayed behind the glass.

It was barely noon, and the lunch rush had yet to really hit. The lulls between rushes were actually some of her favorite times; the customers were more familiar and the restaurant felt more like a casual cafe then a busy sushi bar. Yama actually had the small TV that was set up in one of the cubbies, the holes usually used to hold pick-up and take-out orders, turned on for once, and the murmur of commercials in the background mixed with the ambient music piped overhead by the small speakers in the ceiling. There were only about five people, all older regulars who used Yama’s as an extension of their living room to read or play a quick game of shogi or go before returning to their homes when the lunch rush started to filter in. 

Mr. Fuji was set up at one of the tables near the window, the local paper spread out in front of him with its rows of characters and small advertisements for lawyers, doctors, and tailors. He was the youngest regular, and tended to stay the longest, ordering cup after cup of tea and nibbling on sushi and the occasional noodle bowl. She was pretty sure that Mr. Fuji wasn’t his real name considering he didn’t look close to Japanese, or even Asian, at all, but neither did she until she opened her mouth or you looked past her auburn hair. She tried not to judge, but that didn’t stop her intense curiosity as to who he really was and why he hung out at the restaurant so much. If she didn’t know better, she would say he looked an awful lot like Cyrus when she tried to get a closer look at him. The only problem with that though was how a lot of American men looked the same to her, so she didn’t pay the similarities much attention. 

Risu set down the tray on his table, flashing him a bright smile as she did.

“Here you go! One order of ahi, unagi, and scallop, with a big bowl of edamame,” she said, arranging the plates in front of him while he folded up the newspaper.

Mr. Fuji returned her smile, turning on the charm he seemed to love to dish out.

“Why, thank you, doll! This looks great,” he said, eagerly taking the matcha from her. He gave it an appreciative inhale as he brought it closer.    
She nodded her head towards the newspaper. “How’s the homework going?”

“Well, either this article is about preparations for the lunar new year, or the longest personal ad in history, so that should tell you something, my dear,” he said, pointing at the section of newspaper he had circled in red. Risu tried not to laugh in his face, stifling her giggles. Mr. Fuji tilted his head.

“And what about you? How’s the English coming along?”

“I know the differences between read, read, reed, and red now,” she said, sliding the serving tray under her arm.

“And?”

“ _ Sore wa saigaidesu! _ ” she said with a slight stamp of her foot in frustration. The English language was a hideous beast that only existed to torture non-native speakers as far as she was concerned. She was lucky she was able to speak and understand as much as she did. “It’s so stupid!! Why would anyone make anything sound so similar?!”

Mr. Fuji laughed, pulling his lunch closer to him. “Don’t sweat it, babe, you’ll figure it out,” he reassured her, giving her his usual smile. 

Risu rolled her eyes at the familiar nickname; as far as she knew, he called every woman he met in the restaurant that. If it had been anyone else, she would have made Yama start serving him instead.

“Let me know if you need anything else,” she said, turning to go back to the kitchen. She wanted to do a quick check of the storage room so she had less to do closing up later. 

She glanced over at the TV as she walked by, catching a glimpse of the words ‘special’ and ‘breaking,’ and then immediately changed directions, running up to the sushi bar. Yama jumped where he was, startled by her sudden appearance as she watched the screen in alarm. She pointed past him at the TV.

“Yama!! Quick, turn the volume up!” she said, waving at whatever was going on behind him.    
Yama finally turned around to see a special news report being broadcast on the channel, smoke and bits of dust obscuring what was happening on camera as the cameraman adjusted to try and show a better view of what was going on. He grabbed the remote, and the green volume ticker slid across the screen, the reporter’s voice steadily becoming clearer. The other customers turned their heads at the new noise.

_ “-all police have evacuated the building, and as of now, we have little information as to who is currently attacking the police headquarters- Wait, I see something!! Charlie, zoom in over there!” _

The camera shifted again, zooming in on the blurry image of the police station’s entrance, and the sparks of bright blue smoke that were flickering in the shadows. Risu leaned closer, as if getting on one of the bar stools would help her see better. That color looked awfully familiar. 

The camera suddenly shook, a burst of blue energy streaming out of the doorway it was recording, and a black leather clad figure wearing a helmet ran out of the building. In an instant they were throwing vicious looking balls of blue energy at the closest pack of barricades, decimating the police cars that had been lined up to corner them. A policeman suddenly blocked the view, yelling at the reporter and the cameraman to move back as the sounds of destruction could be heard, screams and metal being ripped apart echoing in the background. 

“Uh, check, please!” 

Yama looked back to see Mr. Fuji quickly getting up, and gathering his things.

“Oh, sure! Hey, Risu-” 

He looked to where his apprentice had been only seconds ago to see the stool empty and spinning in place.

Risu barreled through the kitchen, and dove into the back storage room, clutching her vibrating cellphone. Cyrus’ picture was on the screen, his name blinking as it waited for her to pick up. She backed up into the farthest corner, and finally hit the ‘accept’ button.

“When I said I never want to see you on the 6 o’ clock news, this is not what I meant!!!” she hissed into the receiver, cutting him off before he even began what he was going to say.

_ “That is NOT me! I don’t know who that is, but it’s not me!!” _

“I kind of already figured that out, Cyrus!! Come on, like you’d ever do something like that!!” she said, hearing the near panic in his voice. She wanted to panic right back at him, but knew that wouldn’t help anything. She took a deep breath, trying to calm herself down. 

She heard the faint echo of ceramic and running water in the background from where Cyrus was calling her. She knew he worked as a piano player, jumping from place to place through the music agency he worked with, but sometimes he was out doing other things when the agency didn’t need him. 

“Where are you right now?”   
_ “I’m at the lounge near the docks. I’m in the kitchen, but I don’t know when I’ll have to get back out there… But it’s all over the TV so I thought you might have seen.” _

Risu ran a hand through her bangs, pressing the longest ends to the top of her head. It was the closest thing she could to do to pulling her hair. At least he wasn’t out and about in his hero clothes, but she wished that he was somehow home and five hundred miles away from the imposter. 

“...Cyrus, he’s got your powers.” she said, anxiety almost making the words catch in her throat. She instinctively put her fingers near her mouth, wanting to chew. “How is that even possible? Can people just do that kind of thing?”

Cyrus sighed on the other end, sounding about as nervous, if not more, as she felt.

_ “Not as far as I know. There are two other people who can do it, but one’s my dad and the other’s been dead for almost two years now so… I’m going to have to do some digging.” _

Risu paused, biting her lip. 

“...As yourself, or as… Someone else?” she asked. She had picked up the habit of not calling him Coyote unless they were alone or they were talking at 3 in the morning while he was out working. Even if she was all the way in the back of the restaurant, about as far as away as she could get from any ears, she still wanted to be careful.

He didn’t answer at first, and she could see the look on his face when he was thinking about how to answer her without telling her everything even without him being in front of her. She put her free hand on her hip, pressing her mouth into the usual thin line of frustration, and tapped her foot. She hated it when he did this, even if she knew why.

_ “A bit of both, I have a few things I can do where no one will know it’s me but not be… Not me.” _

Risu didn’t answer at first, trying to figure out what on earth he was saying.

“...Think you could run that through the translator again?” she asked him. “I’m not sure if that was actually English, Cyrus.”

She heard the smallest laugh, and huffed her displeasure at him through the phone.

_ “Sorry, sorry! Ah, what I mean is, I can do some things anonymously. You know, hide who I am online and stuff while I look for things.” _

“RISU!!” 

Risu jumped, Yama’s bellow reaching her even with about two rooms and a hallway between them. It didn’t sound angry, more like he was trying to get her attention. She had been focusing so much on the phone that it was entirely possible that she had completely tuned him out. She wheezed where she was, her heart racing from being so rudely shaken from what she was paying attention to. She could hear Cyrus’ concerned voice in the distance as she got her bearings again.

“H-hang on, I think Yama wants me,” she said, her voice shaking the slightest. She put the phone to her chest.

“WHAT?” she shouted back, walking out of the storage room and through the kitchen. 

“Get out here!! Something’s going on!!”

Risu picked the phone back up. “Hang on, something’s up,” she said, and quickly jogged into the serving area, trying to see what Yama was talking about.

 

Miles away from where Risu was, Cyrus had finally poked his head out of the busy lounge kitchen to look at the rows of TV’s above the bar, and saw different images of Little Tokyo being featured on nearly all of them. He heard Risu’s voice again on the other of the phone, and tried to fend off the impending sense of doom as he saw flashes of the crammed section of city being shown.

“Yeah, uh, Little Tokyo’s being shut down,” he said, his mouth going dry in fear. 

_ “What?! Why- KUSO-TARE ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!”  _ _  
_ **_“RISU!!”_ ** Yama’s offense at whatever Risu had just said was loud enough he could hear him as if the chef was standing right next to him. **_“Watch your mouth, girl, we’ve still got customers in here!!”_ **

Cyrus could see the headlines from where he was standing. The new gang, calling themselves Black Tower, had taken over a bank and was in the process of emptying out the vault and ransoming the employees. They were a bunch of kids, as far as he knew, that posed as Titans to get into areas without suspicion and then caused all kinds of trouble. It had made getting work done by the real Titans extremely difficult the last few weeks, and he was actually grateful he had left Purple Tower to pursue his own interests when the gang had started making trouble. He couldn’t imagine going on missions at a time like this, not when he had a seriously dangerous doppelganger running around on top of the Black Tower pack messing with everyone else. 

But now Risu was trapped in Little Tokyo with them, while a fake was decimating the police headquarters downtown. The fact that this was a coincidence didn’t feel right to him; his gut was telling him one of these was a distraction. He set his jaw, already thinking of where he was going to have to check to try and see if there were any clues as to which was what, or if a third event was being planned for today by Black Tower or anyone else.

“What do you guys plan on doing?” he asked, hearing Risu talking to the customers about leaving.

_ “Uh, well, Yama’s gotta get out of here. If he doesn’t get out before they shut the streets down, Lynn will be stuck downtown until they get those little asses out of the bank,” _

Cyrus chewed his lip, a dozen ugly thoughts jumping into his head all involving what could happen to Risu on her way home from the restaurant if she left before Black Tower was under control.

“Stay at the restaurant,” he said. He waved at his boss, who was already waving at him that he was free to go. A few of the other musicians had started packing up; business could wait another day when the city wasn’t being thrown into chaos by two uncontrolled threats while the police headquarters burned. “I’ll come get you as soon as I can.”

_ “Oh, no, I’m not going anywhere, trust me. I’m going to keep the restaurant open for any stragglers,” _ She paused, and he heard Yama yelling his goodbyes as he probably hurried out the door.  _ “Don’t worry about me, do what you need to do.” _

“If you think I’m just leaving you stranded-!” He started to protest but Risu cut him off before he could finish.   
_ “You’re not! Just come get me for closing! Cyrus, you’ve got bigger fish to catch here,” _

“Fry.”

_ “What?” _

“You mean bigger fish to fry, that’s the saying,” he said, smiling a bit to himself. He was trying to make her laugh, and not worry as much about him as he knew she was most likely doing. It wasn’t every day you saw your friend’s alter-ego being framed on live television. “I mean, technically I do have to catch someone though, so you’re not that far off!”

_ “Oh my God, just shut up and find the idiot that looks like you, please. I’ll go crazy if I have to deal with two of you!” _

Cyrus ran a hand through his hair, his smile turning to the smallest cringe as he walked over and picked his coat up off the piano seat. 

“Sorry, I was hoping I could make you feel better,” he said, leaning the phone on his shoulder so he could talk and put his coat on at the same time. He heard Risu sigh and the rustle of fabric as she sat down.

_ “I’ll feel better when you find this whacko,” _ she said resolutely. He could just see her determined expression in his head.  _ “Don’t worry about me, or Black Tower. Just hit that pavement and find out what’s going on.” _

“Hey, you got that one!”

_ “Don’t push it.” _

Cyrus laughed, and he thought he heard her giggle for half a second on the other end as well. That was much better then hearing the edges of panic in her voice, and he felt a tinge of guilt in making her worry more over him then she already did. He knew she tried not to let what he did take up too much space in her head, but something like this would make it hard for her not to worry less. 

He finished zipping up his coat, and grabbed his messenger bag from behind the piano, swapping his phone from ear to the other.

“I’ll come and pick you up later tonight. When did you want to close up shop?” he asked, walking out the door towards the parking lot. His motorcycle was sitting right where he had parked it this morning, his helmet strapped to the back of the seat. 

_ “Probably pretty early. I was thinking 10, but you can show up earlier if you want something to eat. Just call before you head over,” _

“Alright… If a Titan shows up, make sure you get their ID first,” he said, leaning his phone on his shoulder again as he undid the straps on the helmet. He had to stop himself from reaching for the small storage box with the Coyote one inside it instead. 

_ “And if they don’t have it, punch ‘em!”  _ She laughed on the other end, and he felt a little bit of the weight on his chest let go. He was just glad she wasn’t terrified about being trapped in the same place as a gang with super powers and way too many guns.

Cyrus smiled. “That’s right, you show ‘em who’s boss,” he said. “Okay, I gotta get to work. I’ll text you when I’m done.”

_ “‘Kay. Kick ass, dude!” _

“You too, bye.” 

He heard the call drop as she hung up first, and he paused to look at the screen briefly, nervously tapping his foot as he looked at the picture for a second. He took a deep breath, putting his phone in the same inside pocket he kept the omamori, and put his helmet on. It was time to get to the bottom of this.

 

Hours later, the bottom seemed as far away as it had been when he had begun his search. 

Cyrus sat in his apartment, hunched over his laptop as he scrolled through forums, blogs, twitter feeds, anything that he could use to find some sort of digital trail for what was going on. Black Tower had been easy to track down; they were a bunch of kids, some of them barely older than he was and they trumpeted their plans all over the place when they thought they could get away with it. The bank heist had been leaked on snapchat a few days ago, cocky selfies with text and stickers being traded back and forth, and then hit the reddit forums like wildfire this morning. He wondered sometimes why the police didn’t have a better handle on all the media platforms, but, then again, he was lucky he was able to find the trail he did before it got eaten up by the fast pace of human existence on the internet. 

Try as he might though, he couldn’t find anything connecting the gang to the imposter who had tried to level the police headquarters. The news had clarified a few things; the headquarters had only been partially destroyed, and even then, the more he looked, the more it looked like the main objective had been to trash the place. It looked like a distraction, like they had been getting time for Black Tower to set up, but even with all the evidence he had been able to dredge up, there was no mention of a Coyote look-a-like being used as a bait and switch for the gang. 

He leaned back, stretching and looking out the darkened window. Winter still had a grip on the city. There was a small bite at night with the sun going down hours before it really felt like it should. He looked at his watch, and sighed at the time. He still had about an hour or two before he could head out to pick up Risu and take her home. Black Tower was still holed up in the bank, but the police had been able to set up a perimeter to make sure they would never get out without being seen. Some real Titans had been called in as well, so the lockdown was being lifted. There had been no mention of the Coyote lookalike either, nothing beyond the story being covered over and over on the different news outlets, and the forums churning out hundreds of conspiracy theories, each more ridiculous than the last.

Risu had told him that he could come over early, maybe make him something to eat… His empty stomach could definitely use that. He could bring his laptop with him, and bounce some ideas off of her. Maybe she’d see something he wasn’t catching, she was good at that. 

Cyrus quickly shook his head, scrubbing his face with palms. No, no, that was a bad idea. It was better to keep this as far away from her as he could, or at least until he couldn’t help it anymore. He drummed his fingers on his keyboard impatiently, and then pulled up the next batch of photos of the imposter. They weren’t very good, honestly. All the images were horribly grainy or had a serious layer of dust from the destruction that had been going on. Even with all the hundreds of smartphones and acres of photos that had been posted already, each one was worse than the last. He clicked through them anyway. 

There had to be something, some sort of clue, an inkling of whatever he was missing…   
A flicker of blue caught his eye, and he paused on one of the pictures. This one was from a different angle; still pretty terrible but it was from behind. Something was wrong though.

He squinted at the figure, looking closely at the clothes. Coyote’s outfit had changed when he had taken up the title since he didn’t look like Lu by any means, and even the various news outlets had noticed. It was old news that Coyote wore a helmet and had ditched their signature scarf. It looked as if the masquerader had only gotten about half of the memo though; they were wearing a helmet but had the old scarf and leather jacket, the same kind that Lu had.

Black Tower had a certain pride in their costumes, they even liked to share on whatever platform they could when they were updating their look to follow the current Titans’ trends. They were anything but subtle with their performances. So then what was this imposter doing with old clothes but the new helmet?

He groaned, running his hands through his hair. He had been looking in the wrong direction, just like the rest of the photos. This wasn’t a distraction at all! It was a message, and one that was clearly saying, “Hey, look at me! I’m here, and I want your attention!” directly to him. Well, if they wanted his attention, they certainly had it now. But what did they want it for? 

He stared at the scarf and the old jacket, and felt the familiar itching at the back of his head that something still wasn’t right. This wasn’t just for him… This was for the old Coyote as well, if his hunch was telling him anything. Why else would they mix the two signature looks?

He got up with a sigh and went to his dresser, opening the bottom drawer. He felt around the top of the drawer, and finally found the small jump drive he had taped to it almost a year ago. 

A cop until the very end, Lu had kept records of every single person he had ever helped arrest, fought, or let go, and he had been lucky to have the forethought to download everything before he had destroyed the old set up. It had been hard, being surrounded by so much of what had reminded him of the person he had lost back then, but hopefully it would come in handy now.

Cyrus plugged the drive in, and started combing through the files.

“Alright, Lu, what kind of mess did you leave me…” he murmured to himself. 

 

**_“PUTTING MY DEFENSES UP-! ‘CAUSE I DON’T WANT TO FALL IN LOVE-!!”_ **

Risu turned the volume up on the stereo that was hooked up to the speakers in the shop, cranking the music up so loud that the windows practically vibrated. She liked to try and be courteous to the other shops around the sushi bar, but thanks to the lockdown earlier that day, most every place on their street had closed up early. She grabbed the broom she had brought into the back with her, and started sweeping, dancing along to the music as she swept.

The day hadn’t been a total loss, at least. A large group of stranded college students had crowded into a booth, unable to leave Little Tokyo until the lockdown was done, and she had happily fed them all until they all got word that it was safe to leave. They had left her a giant tip as thanks, and she sent them away with the extra take-out. It was all going to go bad anyway, the orders never got picked up thanks to the streets being jammed and Little Tokyo clamped down harder then a live scallop. Yama would have never let her do it, saying something about health and safety, but she absolutely hated wasting food. The take-out hadn’t been touched by anyone anyway. 

She danced her way from the kitchen all the way out into the seating area, and then really started to get to work. She spun around, pausing to look out the dark windows. It was starting to get pretty late out there, and yet she could still see the flash of red and blue lights peeking through the buildings once in awhile. Little Tokyo had been filled with police lights and sirens since this afternoon, and even now, she could see the brief flicker of search lights coming from where Black Tower was still trying to put up a fight. She wondered how much longer they were going to last; the news had said they had called in the real Titans about an hour ago.

The song she had been listening to was suddenly interrupted, and instead her ringtone was blaring into the shop. Risu dropped the broom and skidded into the kitchen. Cyrus’ picture was lighting up the screen, and she snatched the auxiliary cord out of the phone, grabbing it and hitting the accept button.

“Yo, what up?” she said, twisting the auxiliary cord around her wrist.

Cyrus started to say something, but then yawned into the receiver instead. Risu smothered a giggle, and walked back out into the seating area, sitting on one of the bar stools.

_ “Augh, sorry. I’ve been sitting for way too long. Ah, are you ready for me to come and get you?” _

“Uh…” Risu quickly looked at the phone. It was still pretty early for her to close up, but everywhere else had closed up hours ago compared to them. There wasn’t much for her to do unless she wanted to organize the back storage room like she had been meaning to.

“Yeah, if you want, there’s nothing going on over here anyway. Were you able to do your thing?”

She heard the jingle of keys on the other end and the faint snap of something being closed.

_ “Yeah, for all the good it did me. I can’t find anything on this guy… Or at least anything that guarantees who they are. They’re not with Black Tower though, I figured that out at least.” _

She leaned her head away as something rubbed up against the phone, filling her end with the weird static of fabric on a microphone. 

“That’s something,” she said, trying to make him feel better. “Hey, are you hungry? I can make us some dinner at my place.” Food was the solution to any problem, or was at least a precursor to it. That was her philosophy, and it had yet to fail her.

_ “Food sounds amazing right now. I’ve had nothing but water since lunch.” _

Risu laughed, idly spinning on the bar stool. 

“Pfft, okay, so you'll be swimming through the door, got it. I’ll make fried rice! I’ve got leftovers coming out of my ears,” she said. She had gone overboard the last few times with the rice cooker, and she was sure she had a few extra vegetables rattling around in her refrigerator. Fried rice was always the best comfort food. “Ooh, maybe I’ll use up the rest of that barbeque pork from the other night… You know, the ribs I told you about that I marinated for a few days with all that sauce?”

Cyrus groaned on the other end.

_ “Oh God, stop, you’ll make me eat my helmet!”  _

Risu cackled, unable to stop herself.

“Ahahaha~! Ohmygosh, you make this too easy!!” she laughed at him, grinning at the phone. “Okay, starving boy, hurry up and get over here! You should probably use your fun helmet just in case. I’m pretty sure there’s still tons of traffic everywhere, and I don’t want you stopping to grab your phone on that two-wheeled death machine.”

_ “Aren’t there more mopeds then people in Japan, or something like that? This thing is safer then most cars!” _

She heard the sudden thrum of the motorcycle being turned on, almost drowning out what Cyrus was saying altogether.

“Okay, one, that’s a lie, and, two, get off the phone!!” she said, nearly yelling to make sure he could hear over the motorcycle. She swore she heard him laughing at her, but it was hard to tell with all the background noise.

_ “Alright, alright! I’ll see you soon.” _

“Bye!”   
_ “Bye.” _

She hung up, and looked down at her phone, shaking her head. What a ridiculous person she had managed to make friends with. She tossed her phone up, and then snatched it in the air, hopping off the bar stool and going back towards the stereo. It didn’t take her long to plug everything back in, and start the music back up.

**“Black dress- with the tights underneath-! I’ve got the breath of a last cigarette on my teeth-!”**

She grabbed the broom once again, and started sweeping circles all around the booths and tables, stopping to stack chairs as she went. When she was finished with that, she got out the bucket and mop, and danced her way across the floor again. It was all fairly routine, and while she had been annoyed with it at first, feeling that her time would be better used towards practicing making the sushi she was trying so hard to master while she was studying with Yama, she appreciated the hour or so by herself in the restaurant. It was as if she was burning off all the stress of dealing with customers, and trying to cook faster then she felt people even needed her to (Americans were so impatient!) in playing the music as loud as the system could handle.

She was in the process of dumping out the water from the mopping when she heard the tell-tale squeak of the front door opening, even with the music thumping through the restaurant like it was. She looked up and saw Cyrus walking in, shaking his hair out from wearing the helmet. That was strange, she didn’t think she heard the motorcycle outside; she could usually hear that roaring monstrosity a mile away.    
She reached, and grabbed her phone off the auxiliary cord again, and waved to him from where she could see him in the kitchen. He waved back, starting to walk across the still wet floor.

Risu rushed out of the kitchen to meet him half-way, putting her hands up, and carefully walking as best as she could in her sneakers.

“Whoa! Hey man, be careful! Remember what happened last time?” she said as he walked up to her with an easy smile.

He waved a hand, and leaned down towards her. “Aw, I’ll be fine. It’s just a little bit of water.” he said, closing the distance between them.

Before she could say anything, he had a hand on her hip, and leaned down to press a kiss on her forehead. Risu froze where she was, ice filling her veins as he pulled away from her. Her whole world stopped for half a second as the quick ripple of terror spread through her.

She looked up at the person that looked like Cyrus, but wasn’t him. He was still smiling down at her, the smile she knew so well and loved to see any time because it meant he felt happy and safe, but now it was making her skin crawl.

“What’s the matter?” not-Cyrus asked, looking pleasantly confused at her lack of response to his greeting.

Risu shook her head, smiling back in the reflexive fashion she used when serving customers.

“Oh… Uh, nothing! I just wasn’t expecting that, that’s all!” she said. She took a step back, glancing down shyly at the floor. “You don’t, uh, usually do that when I’m at work.”

Was her voice shaking? It didn’t sound like it, but she was sure it was. She had to keep telling herself to keep smiling, to pretend that this was Cyrus when it really, really wasn’t. The wrongness of it all made her want to run for her life right then and there, but she didn't know what else this person could do. 

“Well, you’re not going to be at work for much longer,” he said. The sentence plunged a dagger of ice in her chest. “Are you ready to go?”

She wrenched her mouth open, trying to stop her jaw from locking from fear.

“Almost! I, uh, promised Yama I would check some things in the back first. You can get comfy out here if you want, I might be a while,” she said, backing away from him as she spoke. She didn’t turn around, facing him as she walked backwards towards the kitchen.

Not-Cyrus shrugged his shoulders, and sat down on one of the bar stools.

“Don’t worry about it,” he said, giving her another smile that she hoped he couldn’t see was making her shake. “Just let me know if you need any help.”

“Hahaha, sure!”

She turned around and walked through the kitchen, catching the sliding door on her way in, and closing it halfway. She didn't dare close it all the way; he might get suspicious that she knew something was wrong. She had her hands in her pocket instantly, gripping her phone so hard, the plastic squeaked in protest at the threat of being crushed. Her heart was hammering in her chest, and she dove into the back storage room for the second time that day, immediately going towards the farthest corner she could.    
She called Cyrus, trying to steady her breathing, and not panic at the number of rings. She bounced in place.

_ PickuppickuppickuppleaseGodpickup- _

_ “He-!” _ _  
_ “He’s here!! He’s here!! He’s here, and he looks like you!! Cyrus, he knows what you look like!!” she blurted out all at once, half-covering her mouth with a hand to make sure she couldn’t be heard. She had to stop the quick sob of relief that almost jumped out of her at the sound of the motorcycle in the background.

“He kissed me, that’s how I knew it wasn’t you.”  She pressed her bangs to the top of her head, feeling dizzy, and swallowed hard. 

She jumped at the sudden screech of tires and the motorcycle’s engine revving the loudest she had ever heard. Cyrus was talking over the noise.   
_ “Run. Run, now. Get out the back door, and just get out of there. Whatever you do, don’t fight him, I have no idea who he is or what he can do-” _

“Hey.”

Risu jumped again, inhaling sharply, and turned around, the phone slipping from her ear and down near her shoulder. Not-Cyrus was standing in the doorway, filling up the whole entrance as he looked at her, his face oddly blank. He shook his head, trying to look confused.

“Who are you talking to?” he asked benignly, taking a step inside.

Risu could hear the real Cyrus still talking on the other end, saying her name, his voice becoming more urgent the more she didn't respond. She shrugged numbly, gesturing with her free hand.

“I… I just, uh, was… Calling Yama...” she said, the terror clear in her voice and her smile fragile.

Not-Cyrus didn't move where he stood, staring at her.

Risu stared back.

He lunged for her and she grabbed the closest storage shelf, the steel racks filled with rice and dry goods lining the storage room, pulling the rack down between them. He jumped back, narrowly missing being crushed by the entire thing, and she snatched up the biggest bag of flour in the pile, lifting it over her head. He looked up just in time for her to swing it at his head, throwing it with a shout.

The bag exploded on impact, knocking him off his feet and flour filling the air. Risu ran for the door, jumping over the storage rack, and trying to avoid slipping on the flour. Her giant knife, the weapon that was almost as big as she was, was leaning on the wall opposite of her. All she had to do was grab it, and go.

A hand suddenly latched onto her ankle, catching and yanking her off of her feet. She slammed down onto the hard tile, her phone sent spinning across the floor. She could still hear Cyrus shouting for her. She looked back, panting in terror, and saw the imposter with a vice grip on her leg.

“You’re stronger then you look, aren’t you?” he snarled, his voice a strange echo of several other people.

Risu tried to wrench her foot away, flipping over, and then kicked as hard as she could. Her free foot connected with a crack, not-Cyrus’ head snapping back, but he didn’t let go. If anything his grip became tighter. She looked back to her knife, the bright red cover calling her, and she willed herself to reach for it, feeling the muscles in her arms protesting. Her fingertips brushed the strap on the floor; all she needed was another inch-!!

White hot pain suddenly shot up her leg, and she screamed, the hand holding her back feeling like thousands of needles being dug into her skin. Her vision swam while the lower half of her body went numb. She fought it, kicking and flailing with all of her strength. She had to get away, she had to move!

She finally grabbed the strap and tugged, but the knife didn’t move. It was like it was nailed down, the weapon not budging with unexpected weight. Why couldn’t she pick it up, she could always pick it up-?! Risu’s breath caught in her throat, confused and terrified, as she threw herself forward and grabbed the strap with both hands, pulling with every ounce of strength she had left.

She was yanked back, the strap ripped from her hands, and pulled by her still throbbing ankle. She swung madly at the imposter, but he picked her up like she was nothing, letting her go only to catch her by the front of her hoodie. He grinned at her, twisting the fabric so it squeezed around her throat.

“Super strength  _ and _ invulnerability? Not bad for a little girl,” he purred.

Risu glared at him, her lavender eyes pinpricks of rage in her face as she continued to struggle.

“This little girl’s gonna jump down your throat and rip your guts out!!” she snarled at him.   
She raised her fists and brought them down on his arms with all of her might. She yelped at the impact; hitting him felt like punching solid concrete. She reflexively opened her fists, hissing at the pain, and tried again to wrench herself from his grasp. It was getting harder to breath.

Not-Cyrus pulled her closer.

“You’re not the only one who won the abilities lottery,” he said, and held her up higher. “I get to borrow what I want, and your’s get suppressed. Nice, huh?” 

She tugged at his hand, needing air, but still growling and baring her teeth at him. She was going to kill him. She was going to beat that stupid smirk off of his copied face the second she got the chance.

“Unfortunately, it doesn’t last that long, so if I want this to work, I’ll have to do something about that trying to hit me thing”

He slammed her head into the ceiling, and then rammed her down into the floor, the storage rack buckling underneath her. Risu gasped where she lay, her whole body screaming with pain. She still gripped his arms, gritting her teeth, and fighting to stay conscious. She hissed where she lay, feeling something warm bubbling at the corner of her mouth. Not-Cyrus leaned down, inspecting her face to see if she was still conscious.

“Aw, you just don’t know when to quit, do you?” he growled, the sound of his many-layered voice reverberating in her ears.

She saw his raised fist, and then a burst of red pain split across the side of her head.

 

He looked down at the crumpled girl on the floor, panting. That had been harder than he had thought it would be. His body mimicry could help him withstand some punishment, but if she had gotten a hold of him more than she already had, she could have done serious damage. He bent down, and picked her up, tucking her under his arm like a sack. He could get used to this super strength, maybe he could find a way to keep her around longer than needed.

He paused in leaving, hearing and feeling the buzz of his phone in his back pocket. He slipped the phone out, looked at the caller, and accepted the call with a sigh.

“Yeah?”

He stepped over the destroyed metal rack, rice noodles and spices crunching under his boots, and walked out of the storage room. 

“I’m working on it,” he grumbled, rolling his eyes at the person on the other end, and passing through the kitchen and into the restaurant proper. “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of your dog problem soon enough. I just picked something up you’re gonna love that should help.”

He shifted the girl under his arm, trying to distribute her weight better. It would be a quick walk to the car, but he didn’t like the idea of dropping her. There was only so much abuse a hostage could take before they were completely useless. He grinned into the phone as he walked out of the restaurant.

“Let’s just say I found his favorite chewtoy. Give it a few squeezes, and he’ll probably come running, just you wat-”

Fire erupted on the street, blocking the way to his car down the road. The flames roared towards him, and he quickly backed up from the scorching heat.

“Sorry, buddy, but she’s not available for take-out!”

He looked up and saw a figure walking towards him, a long coat billowing behind them as they walked up. A skull-like mask reflected the fire ahead of him, making the eyeholes look like pinpricks of light. The mimic glanced back at the encroaching flames; they were too high to jump, blocking the whole street, and he was pretty sure this stranger could control them at will.

He angled the girl away from the man in the mask.

“Who the hell are you?” he snarled, trying to think. That wasn't Coyote by any means, and, even then, he had been sure any heroes would have been chasing around those ridiculous Black Tower children. Who was this guy?

“No one you need to worry about,” the man said, waving a hand. The flames pressed in closer. “Yet. Put the girl down, or we can find out.”

The stranger put his hands in his pockets, waiting to see what he was going to do. 

He didn't put the girl down, instead spreading his legs and looking like he was going to put up a fight. He couldn’t mimic more than one set of powers at a time, and he didn’t want to swap out the super strength and invulnerability just yet. It was handy for hauling his current dead weight around, but then what to do about the fire manipulator…

The girl groaned, twitching faintly under his hold, and he glanced down. That was happening faster than he thought it would, but if he acted fast, he could make it work.

The sudden roar of a motorcycle broke the stand-off’s tension, and he saw a rider speeding straight towards them, streaks of blue fire breaking off behind him.

Cyrus sped down the street, his vision entirely focused on the people ahead of him. He barely saw the flames or the stranger in the long coat, only seeing the person who looked exactly like him with a limp Risu under his arm. He gritted his teeth, and didn’t even stop his bike all the way as he jumped off of it, the motorcycle scraping the pavement as he ran towards the imposter. Blue energy wrapped around his arms, and he charged right towards him.   
“WAIT! Stop!!” 

An arm was suddenly in front of him, and he nearly clotheslined himself on it, Cyrus coming to an abrupt stop. He looked over and finally saw the stranger. He took a step back in confusion. He had seen this hero before, he had been around during the alien invasion a few months ago, and had even helped him out of a tight spot. His skull-like mask seemed unnaturally blurry, something obscuring what he really looked like. 

“Wha- Why?! I can’t, he’s got-!”

The stranger held up a finger, still not letting him pass, and then looked back to the mimic.

“Two against one are pretty bad odds, buddy,” he said, and finally put his arm down. Cyrus moved forward, lighting his arms up again. “Just let her go already, and maybe you’ll be able to walk after this.”

Instead of backing down the imposter laughed, making Cyrus’ shiver as it sounded like him but not like him, several other people laughing together coming from one mouth. Not-Cyrus suddenly dragged Risu in front of him, holding her up and pinning her with an arm around her neck. 

“Are you kidding? You just helped me skip a whole lot of work!” he laughed, his grin looking like a hungry shark’s. 

“Hey, Coyote, how about a trade? That’s what I was hoping for anyway.”

He braced a hand up against Risu’s head, demonstrating exactly what he intended to do. Cyrus felt his stomach drop out of him despite the hundreds of thoughts rushing forward. If he was fast enough, he could stop him. But if he wasn’t, she could die. The energy around his arms flickered, betraying his indecisiveness.

“Just come along with me, and I’ll gladly hand over your little friend to pyro over there,” he said.

Risu moved, Cyrus could see her eyes flutter open for a moment from where he stood and then her face pinched as she slowly came to. What had he already done to her?

The thought terrified him, and he could feel another voice in his head telling him that this was a farce. Criminals never handed over a hostage like this, you had to rip the rug out from under them or overpower them, but he couldn’t risk hurting Risu. If she was just farther away, he could blast him into a greasy smear on the pavement, the anger bubbling under his skin trying to overtake the terror. But instead he was holding her in front of him, ready to snap her neck if they did anything he didn't like. He was frozen in indecision, trying to think of a way for all them of them to get away, but each one seemed to end with someone dead or dying. There wasn’t a right answer no matter where he looked.

 

Risu shook her head, smelling smoke and the scent of intense heat. What was burning…? She squinted, flinching from the pain that assaulted her head, and tried to move. Something was holding her. She could see… Cyrus in front of her, and another person wearing a mask. Everything suddenly rushed back to her, and she looked up to see the grinning face of the Cyrus that wasn’t Cyrus alarmingly close to hers. 

She looked down at the arms that held her, trying to pull away, but he only tightened his hold, bringing his arm even closer around her neck.

“That is a crap deal, and you know it,” she heard the masked person said. He held a flame in his hand, the fire flaring threateningly. “How about we just burn you into cinders and grab the girl ourselves.”

Cyrus looked at the stranger, already starting to protest.   
“Oh, yeah, you’ll be grabbing her alright; grabbing her bones along with mine in the ashes!” Not-Cyrus’ multilayered voice sneered close to her head. “You think I don’t know you can’t hurt me while I’ve got her? I’ve got the best shield in the world right now!”

His voice… Calling her little girl, mocking her while he had beat her with her stolen strength and now he was using her in front of Cyrus. She could see him frozen a few feet in front of her, unable to move while this monster threw her capture in his face. A roaring started in her ears, and everything around her turned red. Something popped in the back of her head.

She screamed in rage, a warcry of indignant fury, and then sank her teeth into his arm as hard as she could. He was the one screaming next, trying to shake her off, but she held on, only biting down harder. She slammed her foot down on top of his, a resounding crack echoing in the street that transformed his scream into a higher pitch of pain, and she finally pulled away from him.   
She didn’t run though, looking down at his buckling form, and with another scream of anger, put her fists together and cracked him across the face, knocking him to the ground.

She reached down and grabbed him by the front of the shirt, blood streaming from his broken nose as she pulled him up like he had her.

“H-how-?!” he rasped, terrified and confused.

“No one knows my powers better than me!” Risu snarled at him, raising her fist. “And I know my invulnerability SUCKS!!”   
She punched him, again, and then kept going, even after it felt like she was punching a brick wall, the copied invulnerability coming back. She pounded him despite the spikes of pain in her arms, determined to beat him into the ground. He yelped and wailed, and when he tried to curl up to defend himself, she grabbed him again and shook him until he relented.

“Hey, hey-!! Easy there, killer!!”

Her arm was suddenly held back as she raised her fist again, and she turned to look up at who had grabbed her, teeth bared and nearly turning on them instead. It was the masked stranger, standing over her, and firmly holding onto her arm. She heard the mimic groan on the ground, and she looked down, seeing the bloody mess she had turned him into. It seemed he had given up looking like Cyrus and was in the process of becoming someone else.

“You’re safe now,” he told her, gently putting her arm down and letting go. “You don’t have to fight him anymore, we’ve got you.”

“RISU!!!”

She was nearly knocked over by Cyrus as he careened into her, pulling her off of her feet in a bone-crushing hug. He held her, wrapping his arms around her and burying his face in her neck, the helmet cool against her skin. She didn’t move at first, too shocked to do anything, and then the pain came back to her. She winced in his hug, trying to ease herself away from him.

“Ow. Ow. Ow, ow, ow-! Cyr-! I mean, uh-! Put me down, please!!” she said, resisting saying his name to get his attention. He had his helmet on, after all, he wasn’t Cyrus right now.

He pulled back, but still held her up, his arms wrapped around her.

“What?” His voice always sounded so weird coming out that thing, semi-robotic and somehow deeper than it already was.

“Everything hurts, put me down,” she said quickly through gritted teeth. Her head was starting to pound and she felt like she had when she had slid down a hill covered in rocks and ice once back home.

“Oh!” Cyrus quickly set her down, and she tried to stay as steady on her feet as she could. 

“Sorry! I, uh, I… Hey!”

Cyrus moved past her, seeing the masked man pulling the mimic up and throwing him over his shoulder. The stranger paused, glancing back, but didn’t face him. The fire that had been blocking the rest of the street had disappeared, leaving a faint fog of smoke lingering in the air.

“What are you doing? Put him down, we need to turn him into the police!” said Cyrus, putting a hand out to stop him.

“That’s what I’m doing,” He didn’t turn, keeping his back to him. “You’ve got other things to do, kid. Let me handle this.”

He ground his teeth in frustration, anger biting into him at the thought of a hero he didn’t even know taking this face-changer in. He could have killed Risu! He didn’t want to let this criminal out of his sight, and he was going to bring him in himself.

“I don’t even know who you are!” he said, walking closer, and trying to get in his way. “How do I know you’re not working with him? Where’s your ID, I want to-!”

“Son!” 

The stranger cut him off, the sudden use of the long forgotten nickname silencing him in an instant. He put an arm out, blocking him from coming any closer, and pointed past him. 

“Look after your girl. She needs your attention more than this scumbag.”

Cyrus looked to where he was pointing, and saw Risu sitting on the curb, leaning against a street lamp. She must have gone and sat down the second she had the opportunity. She looked worse now that he could really see her, her eyes half-closed while she rested. He looked back to where the stranger had been, and he was already gone. Cyrus turned around, trying to figure out where on earth he had disappeared to so quickly. He didn’t hear any vehicles, hadn’t heard any clicks or beeps of some kind of teleporter or seen any flashes of powers being used. His eyes landed on Risu again, and he felt a small hole start to open up in his chest. What on earth was he doing…

He yanked his helmet off, and ran over to her, kneeling on the cement next to her.

“Hey! Hey, are you okay?” he asked, reaching to look at her face. He didn’t want to ask the real questions rattling around in his head. How much had he hurt her? What had he done to make her scream like he had heard over the phone?

Risu peered up at him, blood drying at the corner of her mouth. There was another faint trickle drying on her forehead, and a bruise was starting to bloom on the side of her head. There were bits of plaster and white paint stuck to the top of her head, stained pink from another injury. She gingerly wiped at her mouth, and he saw her hands, the knuckles all split open and her fingers bright red from her punches. Blood had seeped into the many scars on them, making them all look fresh.

He very carefully took her hands, trying to see how much damage had really been done to them. It was tough to tell without pressing, but he didn’t dare test them for fear of hurting her more.

“...I think I hit him a little too hard,” 

Risu finally spoke, and gave him a very small, sheepish smile.

He didn’t know what to say at first, her smile striking a hollow feeling in him, but he smiled back anyway. He carefully ran a hand over her head.

“You hit him great,” he said. He straightened her bangs out, the curls catching in his fingers and then releasing as he gently teased the tangles out. “Let’s get you patched up, alright?”

Risu sighed, leaning into his hand as she nodded her head. She winced halfway through, and put a hand to her head.

“That… I probably shouldn’t do that,” she said, cringing. 

“What did he do to you?”

He couldn’t stop himself any longer. He didn’t move his hand, holding the side of her face. The metal of her glasses brushed his palm. She stared at him for a moment, and he knew she was debating telling him the truth. He frowned, quietly pleading with her to tell him. She sighed again.

“He… Stole my powers,” she said, and quickly followed up at his look of alarm. “It’s not permanent, he said so. But he grabbed me, and kinda… Hit me with the ceiling?”   
She thought for a second, trying to figure out how to describe it. She pointed at her head and then up. “Just kinda… Bang, yknow? And then he punched me, and that  _ really _ hurt.”

She was trying to ignore how big his eyes were and how pale he looked listening to her. Cyrus swallowed hard, and glanced down for a second before looking back up, still looking extremely shaken from her brief description.

“Uh, okay… Um, can you remember everything else that happened…?” he asked, sounding unsure.

Risu was about to nod her head, but then stopped, remembering how it had made her feel earlier. “Yeah. Kinda wish I didn’t though,” she said. “He was a serious asshole, I’m glad I beat the shit out of him.”

Cyrus gave her another cringing smile. He could feel the edges of his calm starting to curl up, beginning to give into the panic he had been holding back for so long. He wanted to throw his arms around her again, and never let go, just to reassure himself that she wouldn’t disappear right in front of him. He squashed it all down the best he could; he could feel everything he needed to later, he still needed to check her over before deciding what to do next. For all he knew, he had to take her to the hospital.

He took out his phone, turning the flashlight on.

“Can I see your eyes for a second?” he asked.

“Yeah, sure.”

He very carefully angled her head up so he could see into her eyes better, and let the flashlight shine over her for a second. It looked like everything was reacting like it should, although she looked awfully confused at what he was doing.

“What are you doing...?” she asked. He turned the flashlight off, and put his phone away.

“I’m trying to see if you have a concussion, but it’s kind of hard… It’s not like I’m a nurse or anything.” he said. He wracked his memory, trying to think of anything else.

“Uh, do you have a headache? Or, like, are you dizzy or seeing double or anything?”

Risu took a second to answer, frowning as she seemed to stop and concentrate for a moment.

“Ah… Only when I move my head, really? I’m not dizzy though, and I can see you just fine,” she said. She rubbed the back of her head, wincing a bit as she did.

Cyrus took a deep breath, and then stood up. “Okay… It sounds like he… Just hit you really… Hard,” he said, struggling to say what had happened. 

The guilt was starting to well up in him, and he was trying to push that down as well. If he had just left earlier, or had insisted on coming to get her when the lockdown had first happened, maybe this wouldn’t have happened. He wouldn’t be looking down at her wrecked hands and blood-stained mouth. Instead they’d most likely be at her place, or his, after eating something and she’d be napping while he did research. It would have been a quiet evening…

He held out his hand, offering to help her up off the curb. 

“Come on, let’s get you home,” he said. He gestured towards her head. “And then we can do something about that.”

Risu gingerly took his hand, her fingers starting to feel stiff and foreign to her, and he pulled her up, easily lifting her despite the weight she felt standing on her own two feet. 

 

The drive home was quiet, devoid of the usual conversation that Cyrus would try to make whenever she was on the motorcycle with him. He knew she hated riding it, so he would try to go slow where he could get away with it, and distract her by talking when he couldn’t. There was no traffic to drive through tonight though, the police having herded the majority of the populace inside hours ago, and the streets were empty. Risu leaned on his back, holding onto him like she usually did, watching the street lights blink past.

The apartment building was quiet as well, no lights on in the windows when they drove up, and she only heard a few idle dogs barking in the distance. It almost felt like if they breathed too loud, they could wake up the entire building on the walk up to the fourth floor.

Getting inside had been interesting. Her fingers had refused to move, and she dropped her keys four times, her hands shaking so badly from pain and coming down from the five hundred things that had been racing through her that she couldn’t keep a hold on them. Cyrus took the keys from her, and she collapsed on the couch as soon as they got in, not even bothering to turn on any lights on the way. He didn’t either, possibly feeling that turning anything on would be too oppressive for the night they had just had, and gathered everything he needed to put her back together again. The light streaming in from the city was enough given that a majority of the street lights were level with the apartment windows anyway.

She let him wash and bandage her hands, clenching her teeth while he ran the water over the open wounds on her knuckles at the kitchen sink. Washing the blood away revealed sore-like wounds, leaving all of the joints exposed from her rage-fueled violence. Some parts of her fingers had started to swell up, and she was having a hard time opening and closing her hands. Everything felt locked up and painful, shocks of pain shooting through her hands and up her arm whenever she tried. She kept her mouth shut though, only wincing once or twice when her knuckles were bumped or brushed up against. 

Cyrus finished the last bandage, carefully wrapping over the last finger, and then taping it off. He held both of her hands out, gently holding them in his, and inspected his work. He could feel something twisting in his chest as he looked at them, the whole thing feeling removed and alien. Her hands had always been rough, covered in scars from years of chopping things, but seeing them wrapped up, white bandages across her knuckles and fingers, felt wrong. They looked so small in his. He didn't want to let go.

He looked up, and watched her, keeping her hands in his. She looked exhausted, quietly staring down at her hands while her hair spilled over her shoulders. They had gotten the plaster out of it, but she would most likely have to wash it to get everything. She hadn’t really talked to him since they had left the sidewalk outside of the restaurant. His chest squeezed as he thought about what he had heard on the other end of the line; her scream and the crashing of metal still echoing in his ears. He closed his eyes, trying to steady his breathing so she couldn’t hear how fast his whole body wanted to suddenly go. She didn’t need him in a panic attack, she needed him as something solid to hold onto. 

Risu took a deep breath and tried to flex her hands with the bandages on them. She flinched as she did, and she saw Cyrus quickly look at her when she did out of the corner of her eye. She finally looked up, meeting his gaze. He looked a wreck, even though she was the one that had been beaten to hell and back, his face unnaturally pale and his eyes wide. She could see his shoulders shake from time to time as he held something back that she couldn’t really figure out.

She sighed and curled her fingers around his wrists, lightly holding onto him.

“I think… We should talk about what happened,” she said slowly, watching him for a reaction.

Cyrus swallowed and glanced away for a moment, biting his lip. He looked back to her and nodded his head.

“Yeah, probably…” he said. He took another deep breath, trying to calm himself. Where on earth did they start? 

He opened his mouth, only to have an extremely angry growl cut him off. He closed his mouth, and looked down at his stomach. He clapped a hand over his middle, feeling the usual burn starting across his face.

“I-I’m sorry-!”

“Pfffft-!”

Risu was shaking with silent giggles, and then finally laughed. It wasn’t her usual, full laugh-out-loud cackle, but it was there, albeit a little tired and breathless. She looked at him, a smile starting to peek out of her. It coaxed one out of him, and he gave her hands the smallest of squeezes, a slight pressure around her palms. 

“M-maybe we should get some food in the both of us first,” she half-laughed. She looked like she was going to get up, starting to pull her hands out of his grip. “I’ll go ahead and make- Oh.”

The brief flash of enthusiasm fizzled out on her face, and she looked down at her hands again. She finally pulled her hands out of his, and Cyrus had to resist trying to stop her. 

Risu turned her hands over, trying to flex her hands again, and inspecting them for the first time since they had been bandaged. She could barely close them into fists, the bandages constricting around the fresh cuts and stinging, and her fingers refused to bend as much as they usually could. It would be impossible to hold a knife or cook with hands like these, her fingers unyielding and wrapped as they were. She couldn’t cook while her hands healed. Something gripped her heart, and started pulling it down, a darkness slowly clouding her chest. 

“I guess… I can’t really… Make anything,” she said, her expression falling flat as her voice went low.

Cyrus watched her, the realization hitting him at what she was saying, and he put a hand on her shoulder. He gave her an encouraging smile, trying to be gentle.

“I-It’s alright!” he said, rubbing her shoulder reassuringly. “We can order something. You wanted to make fried rice, right? Isn’t there a really good Chinese place nearby?”

Risu nodded her head, only wincing the slightest as she did. Her head wasn’t pounding like it had been but it still hurt.

“Yeah, uh, it’s pretty authentiiiic…” She trailed off and dropped her hands in her lap. 

“...I can’t hold the chopsticks.” she said quietly, looking down. “I can’t hold  _ anything. _ ”

Cyrus’ hope at helping her faltered at the defeat in her voice. He had never heard her like that before, not even when she was working with a failing recipe or when she found out she had forgotten an ingredient. Everything was a challenge that she would conquer or find another way around. He thought quickly; what didn’t need any utensils?

“Pizza!” he said. He reached and lifted her chin to coax her into looking up. Her usually bright lavender eyes were dark with something that made him pause. “...You can just hold it. I’ve seen my sister just slide it over the plate, if it hurts to hold it for too long.”

Risu didn’t react at first, only staring blankly at him, and then relented, giving a very small, tired chuckle. “Heh, okay, let’s give that a shot,” she said, and pulled away from his hand to go through her pockets.

“I know a place that delivers this la-”

She stopped, frozen in the action of reaching into her hoodie. She flopped back with an angry groan, slapping her palms to her forehead.

“My phone!!!” She sat back up, slamming her hands onto the couch, and bit back a hiss of pain. “My damn phone’s back at the restaurant-!!”

Her eyes suddenly went wide with frustration, and she tried to dig her hands into her hair.

“AND I didn’t lock up!! That whole place is wide open and the lights are still on and-!! UGHHH-!!”

She tried yanking at the long curls, but she couldn’t even do that, only frustrating her even more as all the things that she hadn’t been able to do suddenly flooded her mind. Everything inside of her fractured at once; her frustration, anger, and heartbreak crashing down on top of her in one giant burst as whatever small string of calm that had been holding her together snapped.

She slammed her fists down on top of her couch with a strangled yell, ignoring the pain as she hit the cushions again and again.

“DAMMIT, DAMMIT, DAMMIT-! FUCK-!!”

Cyrus jumped forward, grabbing her arms, and trying to stop her from smashing the couch’s frame into pieces. 

“Risu!! Risu, no, stop-! You’ll break your hands, stop!!” he said, desperately trying to hold her back.

She fought him, trying to pull away, and nearly dragged him on top of her. He gripped her wrists, digging his heels into the couch cushions. Her bandages had turned bright red, blood seeping through the white cloth, and some had already burst open, fraying and tangling together. He hated thinking it, but he was grateful that it looked like her strength was still suppressed or she would most likely have tossed him across the room. For once, he was stronger than her, and he fought to hold her still, feeling his heart cracking as he did. 

She stopped fighting him, weakly trying to shake him off again, as a sob rattled through her. She was breathing in short bursts, struggling to breathe regularly, and desperately trying to hold back the collapse she could feel rising up her throat. Everything hurt, everything was too much, everything was terrible, and awful, and she absolutely hated the pain she could see on Cyrus’ face as he tried to stop her from self-destructing.

She burst into tears, finally giving up, and wailed. It felt like her insides were being ripped into pieces by everything that had happened, the terror of being powerless and still unable to do anything even now that she was safe. Her refuge had been ripped out from under her, and the defenses she worked so hard to keep up crumbled into dust at the reality of being unable to fend for herself so suddenly.

Cyrus froze, watching the tears streaming down her face as she fell apart in front of him. He pulled her forward, gathering her up, and wrapping her up in his arms like he had wanted to do after she had gotten away from her kidnapper. He held her as tightly as he dared, determined not to let go until he was sure she wouldn’t disappear right in front of him somehow and her pain couldn’t burn her out of existence. She sobbed against him, her face pressed into his chest, and he could feel her hands gripping his shirt the best they could. He wasn’t going to let go, not until she felt better or he could reassure himself that she was really, truly safe.

“I couldn’t do  _ anything!! _ ” she cried desperately, barely heard above her choking tears. “I tried-so-HARD-but-!! All he did was  _ laugh _ at me-!! I-I c-couldn’t-!!”

Cyrus squeezed his eyes shut, feeling his chest tightening, and buried his face in her hair, leaning his head on top of hers as he held her. He rubbed her back, slowly rocking her.

“I know, I know, it’s okay,” he said. “You did good, you did so good, it wasn’t your fault…”

She only seemed to cry harder at his reassurances, her wails muffled in his hold. He could feel tears starting to prick at his eyes, and he took a shaking breath.

“I’m sorry,” he said, his grip on her tightening as he held onto the back of her hoodie with all of his strength. “I’m so sorry I wasn’t there-! I’m sorry I wasn’t fast enough-!”   
He choked, the anxiety and guilt finally spreading through him and sealing up his throat. This was his worst nightmare come true, and he didn’t think he could fight it any longer. He felt her shaking her head against him, trying to say something, but couldn’t through her sobs. She was crying too hard. He let the emotions rattle through him, but didn’t let go.

She cried for what felt like hours, letting it all out while he rubbed her back and tried to soothe her as best as he could. She wanted to comfort him, hearing his apologies and how the words caught in his chest and made him shake, but she couldn’t with how she was. Instead she cried until she completely exhausted herself, finally stopping when the tears wouldn’t come anymore, and she lay hiccuping against him, her breath slowly returning to normal. She barely had the energy to try and sit up.

The apartment was completely dark and still. She could see the shadows of the late night stretching across the floor, the street light outside coloring everything with a strange blue-based shadow. She sighed, wiping at her eyes, and looked at the dark stain on his shirt from where she had been crying the whole time.

“...I’m sorry I got you all wet,” she said, feebly picking at the fabric.

Cyrus stared at her for a moment and then shook his head. “It’s okay, I’m washable,” he said. 

She leaned her head against him again, and returned the long hug he had been giving her, loosely putting her arms around him. She didn’t say anything for a while, listening to the quiet around them. She heard the low whoosh of a few cars driving by on the street below. The yellow lights passed over the ceiling and then left, the dark coming back instantly.

“...You don’t have to be sorry for not being there,” she said, breaking the silence. She closed her eyes. “You drive a motorcycle, not a rocket ship. You couldn’t have known what was going to happen.”

Cyrus let out a faint, bitter chuckle, and leaned his head back on the couch.    
“I’m the hero,” he said, his smile half there and sounding as if he didn’t quite believe himself when he said it. “I’m supposed to be there all the time. It’s what we do.”

Risu opened her eyes, and looked up at him.

“You’re here now, aren’t you?” she asked him. 

She let the question hang in the air, hoping he could understand what she was trying to say with him. She didn’t want him to feel guilty for things that were out of his control. She had seen what that guilt could do to other people, the unpredictable eating them up from inside out. She remembered the helplessness on her father’s face when they had finally admitted her mother into the cancer ward, how he had stayed up for weeks and wandered the house like a ghost. She didn’t want that for Cyrus. 

Cyrus stared up at the ceiling, feeling the weight of her in his arms and the cold spot on his chest where her tears were starting to chill from the air. He idly gave her back another gentle rub. His emotions felt like a jumbled up puzzle, but when he focused on her, that he  _ was _ here now, it didn’t feel as impossible to deal with. 

“Yeah… I guess I am,” he said. He looked down at her, and gently ran a hand over her head, then leaned his head back again. “...Do you still want food?”

“I am  _ so _ damn tired, no thank you.”

“Yeah, me neither.”

Risu tried to laugh, but it only came out as an exhausted wheeze, making her snicker a little harder at herself. She felt him silently laughing as well, and smiled. This felt much better. She rested her head on him again, adjusting so that she was no longer pressed against the cold saltwater stain on his shirt, and closed her eyes.    

 

She woke up a few hours later, her head finally feeling like it wasn’t going to explode from some unknown pressure, and almost didn’t know where she was at first. It felt strange to be on her couch, the apartment pitch dark, and feeling someone else under her. She lifted her head, and looked over at Cyrus. He was completely asleep, a faint snore trying to sneak its way out of his mouth with his head tilted back to rest on the arm of the couch. She very carefully pulled herself away, edging herself out of his arms. She paused when she felt his hands close on her, almost not letting go, and waited for them to relax again. 

She slid away from him, and went over to the linen closet, pulling out an extra blanket that she kept for him now. She went back to the couch, and laid it over him. She crept back over to the other side of her tiny apartment, changed into her pajamas behind the room the divider she had set up, and then collapsed into her own bed. Being cuddled up to Cyrus wasn’t terrible, and she knew why he hadn’t wanted to let go of her, but she needed to be close to her alarm clock to beat Yama to the restaurant in the morning. If she was lucky, she could get in, and fix everything before he got there to make that day’s batch of noodles.

She thought of what it had felt like, being held as tightly as possible, and falling asleep to someone else’s heartbeat in her ears. She sighed, snuggling deeper into her blankets. It had been a relief, honestly, to feel that safe. She had been grateful for him before, and the fact that he had refused to let anymore harm come to her, even from herself, made her want to get up and hug him to let him know how much she appreciated him. Having a best friend was a nice change compared to having no one around at all before.  

 

Unfortunately, morning came much too quickly. Risu groaned at the screech of her alarm clock, and she dragged herself closer to the disgusting sound to silence it. She slammed her hand down, and heard the tinkle of something break as it stopped abruptly. She lifted her head, peering up to see yet another alarm clock smashed under her hand. Well, it seemed like her super strength had come back without any problems. She rolled over, curling up underneath her nest of blankets again, and tried to talk herself into getting up. 

She was still sore from last night, her back and neck aching while the rest of her quietly whined whenever she moved. She peeked at her hands, and saw the bandages that she had nearly destroyed. Her hands looked even more of a mess in the early morning light. The blood that had seeped through had dried up, becoming a rusty brown and turning the frayed bits of cloth into stiff boards taped to her skin that she wasn’t looking forward to pulling off. The bits of skin she could see were a dark purple, her knuckles completely bruised and slightly swollen. She needed a shower, then to bandage her hands back up, and then take some Tylenol… Probably showering first, and then prying everything off would be a good idea. 

She rolled out of bed, putting her feet on the floor, and paused in getting up when she thought she saw dark brown hair out of the corner of her eye. She looked down near the end of her bed, and sitting in the middle of the tiny corridor her room divider made between it and her bed, was Cyrus. He was completely blocking the way to her bed, unless a person wanted to jump over him. He was leaning against the bed frame, arms folded and sitting cross legged, and looked like he was sound asleep even while sitting on the floor. Had he been there the whole night after she had gotten up?

She climbed back onto her bed, and crawled over to where he was leaning, looking down at the tousled head of hair. She carefully put a hand on his shoulder, and tried to wake him as gently as she could. Sometimes he jumped when she would wake him up on her couch, and she didn’t want to do it this morning for sure.

“Cyrus?” she called to him, shaking him. “Cyyyyrus, hey, wake up-!” 

Cyrus flinched, frowning as he slowly woke up, and looked up at her, bleary eyed. His eyes almost startled her; she didn’t think she’d ever get used to seeing the real color of them, the bright blue against the black looking strange on him as opposed to the contacts he always wore. She waved at him, kneeling on the bed above him, and gave him a small smile.

“ _ Ohayo,  _ sleepy!” she said, and put her hands on her hips. “What, the blanket I gave you wasn’t good enough?”

It looked like he was still waking up, rubbing his face, and then seemed to really see her. He blinked a few times, and shook his head, looking awkward.

“Ah, no, no, it was fine…” he said. He glanced away. “I just sort of… Wanted to make sure you weren’t going anywhere.”

Risu tilted her head, frowning, and then it clicked. He had been afraid she would be gone or someone might come to take her again, so he had put himself somewhere to make sure that wouldn’t happen. Her smile widened, and she gave his hair a toss. She slid off of her bed, sliding off the very end so she didn’t have to walk over him or ask him to move.

“You want breakfast?” she asked as she did.

Cyrus paused in stretching, back arched and arms up in the air. 

“Wha-? It’s like 5 in the morning, where on earth do you have to be?” he asked. He bent sideways, trying to crack his back. The floor had probably been a bad idea now that he was waking up to deal with the consequences.

“The restaurant,” Risu said as she walked into the kitchen. She pulled open the refrigerator, having to remind herself to be careful so she didn’t yank it off its hinges. There had to be something in here she could make that didn’t require a lot of fixing up. “I have to get over there and put everything the way it was before Yama gets over there to make today’s noodles.”

She looked back at him as he flopped onto the couch.

“You ever try natto?”

“What?”

“Fermented soybeans, it’s good. Wakes you up.” 

She was already grabbing the container along with the leftover rice that she was going to have to use up. She would usually make fresh rice, but she wasn’t sure if she had time. Rice, natto, and miso, that would have to do it. She was about to put the kettle on to make some instant miso when she remembered that she couldn’t hold any utensils. Risu stopped and thunked her head on the counter, making Cyrus look up from his phone.

“What’s up?”

She silently held her hands up.

“I forgot I don’t have hands,” she said, her voice muffled with her head on the counter. She lifted her head only to rest her chin on it. “...I also remembered that I’ve got to pick up the storage room with these dead weights. How the hek am I gonna get all that flour off the floor…”

Cyrus put his phone down. “Flour?”

Risu stretched her arms over the counter, looking an awful lot like a lion with her mane of auburn curls thrown around her head like it was. It was one of the reasons why she wanted a shower after finally eating something. Her stomach felt painfully empty without any dinner the night before.

“I threw, like, 23 kilos of flour at him,” she said with a shrug.

“Ah.” Cyrus’ brief look of understanding turned into confusion, his brows knitting together.

“...How much is that? Like, in pounds.” he asked her, looking like he was trying to mentally figure it out but was having trouble considering how early it was.

“Like, 50, I think? I dunno, you guys’ measuring stuff is weird. Why the hek don’t you use the metric like everyone else?”

Cyrus put his hands up. “I don’t know, it’s not like I make these decisions!” he said, almost laughing at the scowl on her face. It was hard to take her seriously when her hair looked bigger than she was, the curls tossed every which way. 

“Yeah, well, there’s 23 kilos OR 50 pounds of flour all over the damn place, and  _ I’ve _ got to clean it up somehow.” Risu grumbled. Her stomach rumbled loudly and she groaned, putting her face in her arms. “Ughhhh, but I’m hungryyyy and I wanna shower but that stupid thing’s gonna take  _ foreverrrrr _ -!!” She looked up again.

“You wouldn’t happen to have, like, secret cleaning powers up your sleeve, would you?”

Cyrus smiled, rubbing the last dredges of sleep from his eyes. “Ha, no, sorry,” he said. “Just boring old energy manipulation, nothing really useful.”

“Ugh! What good are you then?!” 

Risu feigned disgust at him, finally getting away from the counter and walking over to the couch. She dropped next to him, sitting cross legged and holding her ankles as best as she could.

Cyrus paused in idly scrolling through whatever he was looking at on his phone, thinking for a moment.

“...How often do the storage shelves fall over? Are they bolted to the walls?” he asked, tilting his head in thought. 

Risu looked at him, not understanding what he was trying to get across at first.

“Um… No…?” she said, and then her eyes lit up. “Ohhhh!! No, they fell down once when there was an earth person running around the park a few streets over!”

“And Black Tower  _ and _ the Titans were in town last night,” Cyrus said, pointing a finger at her. He smiled at her. “All those crazy kids? It’s bound to get pretty rowdy, and cause some damage. It happens all the time around here.”

Risu nodded enthusiastically at him, but was then distracted by her hands. That solved the storage room problem, but what about her? She frowned, thinking, and then looked up, the answer dawning on her. She held her hands up for him to see.

“The storage shelf fell on me!” she said. “I told him I was going to organize the back! And we can just say you were there, and rushed me home!”

She paused, thinking for a moment. “Wait, if that actually ever happened, would you let me close up at all?” she asked, testing the validity of her idea. 

“Absolutely not, I’d be getting you the hell out of there!” he said, almost sounding insulted that she would even think to ask. 

Risu tried not to laugh too much at him, giggling on the couch next to him. She almost felt bad for suggesting that to him at all, but she had seen when he had tried to lie to her a few times. Cyrus was a hero, but that didn’t mean he was very good at lying when it came to less important things, like whether or not he had been the one to rearrange all the condiment containers on her once at the restaurant. 

“Okay, so, I think this will work,” she said, leaning back into the couch. She looked over at him, holding her hand out. “Can I borrow your phone? I think I should call Yama anyway just to warn him.”

“Oh, sure,” He brought up the call feature, and then handed it to her.

She held it awkwardly in her hand, trying to balance it in her stiff fingers, and typed in the phone number. She quickly slid the phone into the nook between her ear and her shoulder, and listened to the phone ring, idly bouncing her foot. It rang the full length of time, and then the voicemail picked up. She glanced at Cyrus; hopefully he wouldn’t be offended for not speaking English around him.

“ _ Ah, hey, Yama! _ ” she said, and saw Cyrus curiously tilt her head. She gave him a small, nervous smile and then sped along in her native tongue. “ _ Um-! So, something really crazy happened last night! Don’t worry, I’m okay. Uh, kind of. I don’t know what happened exactly, but I was organizing the back, and, uh… One of the storage things… Fell on me. Don’t freak out, Cyrus was there, and he helped, but he wanted to make sure I was okay, so we just kind of ran out so he could fix me up. I wasn’t able to lock up, and I’m really sorry about that! I also left my phone at the restaurant, so, uh, call this number when you get this, I guess? Uh, again, I’m reallyyyy sorry, please don’t be mad!! Bye! _ ”

She slid the phone off of her shoulder, and tried to catch it, fumbling with the slick surface. Cyrus quickly caught it and hit the end button on the screen. He looked to her, phone in hand.

“That was… Fast,” he said. “Do you think he’ll get all that?”

Risu looked at her hands, trying to think of ways she could try and help herself keep a better handle on things until her hands healed a bit more. “I sure hope so,” she said. “I told him to call you, so if you see, like, 6 missed calls later, that’s why.”

Cyrus’ eyes widened at her statement, and he looked down at his phone, almost as if he was expecting it to start ringing off the hook that instant. He shook his head, and sank back into the couch. 

“So… Did you still want to go to the restaurant to try and clean up?” he asked her.

Risu shook her head. “Nah, there’d be no point. I’ll have to go over there later though,” she said, and paused, thinking. “...And then he’ll probably send me home when he see these.”

She nodded at her hands. Cyrus nodded in agreement, and then carefully leaned closer to her.

“Does this mean we can both go back to sleep?” he asked, sounding hopeful. 

Risu opened her mouth to say no, but then stopped as she looked at him. Despite the few hours of sleep they had been able to get, Cyrus still looked almost as anxious as he had been when she had dozed off last night. Was he still worried about her, or had the events of last night chased away any kind of restful sleep for him? She remembered once when he had fallen asleep on her couch, like he seemed to do a lot when he showed up at 2 AM; burnt out, hungry and smelling like firework smoke, and had talked in his sleep. His quiet cries had been hard to understand, but she had seen the sweat on his brow and the panic in his sleep-paralyzed limbs. She wouldn’t be surprised that instead of sleep, the only thing that had happened to him was a replay of her being held against her will in front of him.

She was hungry as a bear, and dying for a shower. She thought of how he had felt last night as he had held her, comforting her despite how his arms had shook and his voice cracked with guilt. If she asked, she was fairly certain he would be just fine with running out and grabbing them both something to eat while she took a shower, but she didn’t want him to worry about her for a little bit. If he could be there for her when she needed it, she wanted to be there for him as well. 

“Yeah,” she said. “I think that sounds like a great idea.”

She pulled the blanket over to herself, and situated herself on the opposite end of the couch, half lying down. She motioned for Cyrus to come over and join her. He blinked, looking confused for a moment. Risu smiled at him.

“C’mere!” 

He pointed at her. “Over there? With you?” he asked, looking unsure. 

She nodded her head encouragingly. He hesitated, still looking unsure of what was going on, and biting his lip in indecision. A few seconds passed, Risu letting him make up his mind, and he moved forward, settling down beside her. She moved a few inches away, making room for him, and settling into her own little cocoon with the blanket. He put one of her arms around her, loosely holding her. He tucked his other arm under his head, and she happily nestled in against him. 

It was quiet for a moment, and then Cyrus spoke again, leaning over her the slightest so she could see him out of the corner of her eye.

“Are you sure…?” he asked again, looking less nervous but still wanting reassurance.

“Mm-hm,” she said, nodding her head. “Are you?” 

If she was wrong about his wanting to stay close to her, he could say something now. She wouldn’t be upset. He went quiet again, and she felt him slowly relax as he lay next to her. He readjusted his arm so his hand lay firmly against her.

“...Yeah,” he said, and laid his head back down.

Risu smiled a little bit to herself, and tucked her head against the blanket. She closed her eyes, feeling comfortable and warm. Cyrus very carefully pulled her closer, and rested his head on top of hers with a sigh, his whole body finally letting everything go. He could breath, knowing exactly where she was and being able to have a hand on her, and he closed his eyes without even realizing what he was doing. The spring in his chest that had been curling tighter and tighter slowly let go as he listened to her breath. There was no danger here; just a couch, the faint grey darkness of early morning, and her. He took a deep breath, and let it go, feeling every panicked laced thought going.

He fell asleep almost instantly.  


End file.
